£300 Argos treat.

[Mama Sumae]

Hi guys, so the Missus received a surprise £300 argos gift card for Christmas (nice ) and after much thinking she couldn't come up with anything she wants from them (suggestions very welcome). I will avoid expanding on it but even though Argos isn't the best retailer for tech out there I thought I would bite anyway and spend the "free credits" on a new laptop for her.

I had a look through for something in that price range (£350) but the information/specifications provided on the website are often incorrect/missing and simply terrible.

After a tedious search I picked a few models and could really use some helpful feedback from you clever gents (and ladies as my missus pointed out ) as I struggling to find the best balance. Drive space isn't of much concern, she will mostly use it for light stuff such as web browsing and office work but I might nick it once in a while.

HP G62 Series 500GB http://www.argos.co.uk/static/Produc...s|14419040.htm

Samsung RV540 320GB http://www.argos.co.uk/static/Produc...s|14419040.htm

Toshiba C660 640gb http://www.argos.co.uk/static/Produc...s|14419040.htm

Toshiba C660 320gb http://www.argos.co.uk/static/Produc...ssentialExtras

If any other Argos laptop catches your eye do post as I am far from savy in these matters and have probably made some bad choices.


Thanks in advance Ladies and Gents

[Zhaoman]

Hey, the laptops you found are all fine but they have the older generation of Intel processor.

The cheapest ones I found with the current generation are these:

Toshiba C660

Acer 5749

Samsung RV520

They're all a penny shy of £400 unfortunately but I would personally fork out the extra £50 for the slight power saving and the (quite significant) performance increase thanks to Turbo Boost and also the much improved IGP. But I'm not sure if you need those features at all since you're using it for light office work. You could save some dosh and go for a £300 one and this is the only one worth considering (out of the ones on Argos ):

Samsung RV510

It's a step down in performance but it's well capable of office work so you probably won't even notice it and save £50 in the process!

[Jasp]

Offering an alternative, sell them on the bay, theirs a couple of £50 ones on their fetching around £40-45 so I would expect if you asked £250 you might get it.

[streetster]

Offering an alternative, sell them on the bay, theirs a couple of £50 ones on their fetching around £40-45 so I would expect if you asked £250 you might get it.

This was going to be my suggestion... even if you lose £50 of the voucher you're more than likely be able to make that up by getting a laptop from a different (ie better!) retailer...

Mark

[Behemoth]

Add ebay fee's on top, not worth doing.

Either the HP or the Samsung are both cracking laptops for the money, wouldn't go near aToshiba personally unless it's one of the higher end models, that and they bloat them out with lots of unwanted junk.

[Lucio]

If it were me, I'd consider putting the money towards one of these EEE Transformer; or the newer version once they've available.

More convienient for light web browsing and email, and still perfectly capable of using GoogleDocs to cover office work.


Out of the laptops you've picked though, the Toshiba are the brand we tend to use at work and are fine providing you can tolerate the shiny glass screen.

[Behemoth]

If it were me, I'd consider putting the money towards one of these EEE Transformer; or the newer version once they've available.

More convienient for light web browsing and email, and still perfectly capable of using GoogleDocs to cover office work.


Out of the laptops you've picked though, the Toshiba are the brand we tend to use at work and are fine providing you can tolerate the shiny glass screen.

This is also good advice, I was tempted to get one myself when I was in the market for a new laptop, but I needed the flexibilty of Windows 7 so I ended up with an Asus X52F laptop, which is alovely bit of kit. Knocks the stuffings out of the old HP G70 120EA I had before it, horrible, large noisy thing it was.

[Mama Sumae]

Thanks for suggestions, amazingly helpful as always

Selling the vouchers on ebay was a bit temping if only to avoid Argos, but it wouldn't really be worth the trouble since ATM we only need a small laptop and Argos should suffice.

When looking into Zhaoman's links I actually came across this MSI CR640 for £399 with an i5 2410M, do MSI laptops have a good rep?

Its priced the same as the other i3 laptops so it seems a rather good deal, or have I missed something about the laptop?

Thanks again

[Zhaoman]

That looks like great specs for the money. A word of warning: my friend has an MSI laptop and the hinges of the screen have cracked after 2 years of use and they're falling apart, but he does lug it around everywhere with him and gets heavy use so maybe it would be fine if treated with a bit more care. MSIs have always been great in terms of specs and his laptop hasn't suffered any problems on that front. The newer MSI models are supposed to be sturdier but you only truly know after a few years use

A second word: The i5 2410M is very speedy! I have the same processor on my el cheapo Dell and I was surprised when I got it to find it runs Supreme Commander 2 on High and recently I've been playing Skyrim on Medium with no problems (on the Intel IGP!). I did not expect such good performance so be warned it may come as a pleasant surprise!